[SPOILERS] yuris125, pitboss 76

[yuris125]

Yeah that's what I suspected. Just wanted to be sure

Still upset at myself for not spotting the Civil Service bulb. Inexperience with common bulbing paths certainly showed itself

Oh well, nothing for it now. Gotta keep going with what I planned. The truly annoying part would be if Scooter picked Theology as his tech to hard research, because that almost certainly would finish before my great prophet




Capital started the settler. Saver is finishing the library, for that sweet sweet multiplier of commerce from the gold mine. Then it will start a missionary, grow to 5, and switch to settler. Missionary will finish with overflow from settler, and that will let me chop a monastery in city 4 as soon as it's settled

[yuris125]

Confirmed that there's indeed seafood to the south of the island




Now here's the thing. Assuming the peak is in the middle of the sea, and everyone's island extends to it, there's high chance of there being even more seafood on its sides. This may make settling on the stone preferable to settling on the horses. However this more advanced spot is also more exposed, especially to vikings

I will not be able to decide on this, or even confirm presence of more seafood around the peak, for a while. The galley has to turn around and be ready to pick up the worker chopping the capital's settler as soon as he finished the chop. He will need to help with chopping one of the island's forests into the capital (the other one will be left for the future city), then they both will sail to the 3rd city location. This is all pretty tight, and I don't have spare moves on the galley to look around the peak further. Will make that call once the settler for this spot is ready - should have more info on what Thoth is doing by then as well

Also pictured, the event log showing that Scooter got free C1 promotion on his triremes from an event

In final bit of foreign news, Pindicator also got the 3rd city. I more or less accepted that I will be among the last to the 3rd, but hopefully tile improvements I'm happy with will let me stay on par with others, and I will catch up by the time 4th and 5th are sttled

[yuris125]

One turn of working an improved 2/1 forest before whipping the settler. Next builds in the capital - overflow from settler into a workboat for the new city, then another worker with the help of a chop, regrow to 6 on forge, and start another settler. I accepted that I won't be able to immediately employ an engineer after finishing the great prophet. But it's less time-sensitive - especially if I decide to slow-build / chop Apostolic Palace, and save an engineer for a bulb later. Northern worker is going to improve the grassland wines for city 4

Saver popped borders at the end of the turn, and revealed that barbs have a worker at Wolfpack Tower. Maybe I could steal it...

[civac2]

Civil Service is coming pretty quickly even without the bulb. I wonder if bulbing CS is really worth it.

[yuris125]

Well, Scooter is getting about 15 turns of Bureaucracy more than anyone else (he's running it from T19, I'll get it T33-34, don't think it can be hard-teched much faster). As he showed in 73, Bureacracy helps a lot with setting up the snowball

Now, there is a big difference, in that here he doesn't have access to bureucracy-powered whips. He's not spiritual (wonder if he wanted Gandhi himself) and is in serfdom now. But still, he gets +4hpt compared to me, assuming his capital is set up similarly, and boosted chops, of which I won't get any, having chopped all capital's forests before bureaucracy. I think it's definitely an advantage he can leverage

Although one more consideration is that, being non-spiritual, he had to go through anarchy to switch to bureaucracy and other early/mid-game civics, and would want to get it out of the way as early as possible

So bottom line is - I think it definitely was worth it for him. For me, I would've had to test it to know for sure. But I am unhappy that I didn't see the option, and didn't test it

[yuris125]

Looked in the religion screen, and it shows Christianity and Taoism as founded




Think we'll need Ramk's magic to assign holy cities for these religions. Which could get tricky - if I am the one supposed to found Christianity, and get a random spread to city 3, it's not guaranteed where the holy city would land. If Taoism founding is delayed until later, and the founder has multiple cities with existing religions, determining the holy city could be even trickier

[yuris125]

A great artist has been born - hard to be sure whose it is, everyone's score went up this turn. But logically it should be Scooter's and he finished Music. Hope he doesn't use it to bulb Theology - but researching Music just for that would've been a waste. If I were to guess, he's setting up a Nationalism bulb some time down the line

[civac2]

The bulb has the additional cost of having to run specialists which are not great and raising the GP counter. T19 is pretty quick though.

The artist seems to want to take Divine Right before Nationalism. Don't think the Nationalism bulb is viable unless you want Spiral Minaret too.

[yuris125]

The bulb has the additional cost of having to run specialists which are not great and raising the GP counter. T19 is pretty quick though.

On the other hand, running specialists lets you improve fewer tiles, in a situation where we start with a single worker for two cities, and struggle for worker turns. GP counter is a fair point, but probably not a huge deal for a Phi leader? After all, I'm bumping mine with the great prophet play too

The artist seems to want to take Divine Right before Nationalism. Don't think the Nationalism bulb is viable unless you want Spiral Minaret too.

Hmmm you're right, thought he could avoid Divine Right by not researching Theology, but Theology is also ahead of Nationalism in the priority list

Well, that's why I dismissed the Music opening myself, I couldn't figure out a good immediate use for the great artist. And if I couldn't figure it out in several days before the game started, I wouldn't figure it out while playing a turn at 3am Maybe Scooter just sits on it for a future golden age

[yuris125]

Did not take a screenshot, but I did settle the orange dot this turn. T27 - at least I beat Thoth to the 3rd city (merely on turn order, he has a settler in position)

Commodore already has a settler for 4th city, my scout is in his land currently and saw it this turn (western scout is keeping an eye on Thoth and the land between us, not scouting Scooter). My 4th city is scheduled for T31, hopefully I'm not too far behind on that